Make your talisman with ONLY burnable materials, not metal or wire! Winter Solstice is the longest night and shortest day of the year. This day marks the death period, the turning point from darkness to light. In many cultures this dark time is indicative of a time to release, to let go of the old self, and to prepare for new beginnings; the new growth of the spring. Rituals are performed in order to enact this time of release.

Rituals help us to feel the experience, to have an actual tangible event locked into our memory. Rituals also help us to focus our intention and with focused intention miracles happen. One of my favorite rituals is that of creating a Talisman.

A Talisman is an object, which is created that holds a belief of an individual. Many people are trying to rid themselves of a belief, an attitude, a characteristic, a behavior, or even a feeling about another person that has burdened them; making their life less than perfect. From a shamanic perspective the making of a Talisman is a powerful procedure to perpetuate the release process. In fact the Talisman becomes the object of release. This is the incredible power of the Talisman; it isn’t just a symbol of an attitude or belief, but it becomes the attitude or belief. This all comes about through focused intent, and learning how to imbue power into an object.

This is a perfect time of year to let go of the old and to bring in the new. Regardless if it is winter solstice, the first of the year, or any time during the cold winter months, the time is right for the psyche to respond to a releasing/reclaiming ceremony. Being that it also the new millennium (we are on the other side of 2012) the power is even greater, LightSong participants will tap into this MAJOR lifting of the veils. I highly recommend that you perpetuate this release/creating time by creating a Talisman with great care and intent.

To create your Talisman, I suggest you go out into nature. Have in your mind your intention and ask Spirit to help you. Take a walk and start to collect sticks, grass, flowers, leaves, and other objects that you can put together into a Talisman. I suggest that you create a Y shaped talisman; one side representing release and the other side representing what you what to gain/create. Make sure that everything on your Talisman is burnable. We will dance these and throw them into our sacred fire. The sacred smoke will carry your intention out into the universe.

As you are constructing your Talisman bring your total intention and concentration into the fact that the Talisman is your belief. The nature of your object is not what is important; the power and the intention that you put into it is. Do this in silence, in a place where you will not be disturbed and where you can concentrate. Do not share with family or friends what you are intending. Many of us have the habit of breaking the power of the moment by talking about it. You want the power to build inside of this Talisman until you are ready to burn it. When not praying with it keep it covered, preferably in red. You may wish to keep the Talisman with you for a few days, even sleep with it by your bedside. I suggest that you meditate with it, forming strong energy of intention until you feel that the Talisman “becomes” your intentions.

Watch for magic, the Talisman can actually start looking different as it shapeshifts into your intentions.

Read more about this ceremony in Jan's article: A Powerful Declaration to the Universe.

The founder of Igniting Spirit, Karen Hefner, sincerely strives to facilitate and guide each client’s healing and learning in a gentle and loving way.

After studying, experiencing, and practicing alternative modes of healing and shamanism for over a decade, Karen has dedicated herself full-time to being in service as a catalyst for personal growth, expansion and healing. She is an Associate Teacher of the LightSong School of Shamanic Studies, a Usui/Tibetan and Karuna Reiki Master, holds Master’s degrees in Science and the Arts, a Doctoral degree in Shamanism, and is a certified F.I.R.E instructor. Karen has a strong teaching background that dates back to the mid 1980s. She is also a minister, cancer survivor, mother, and grandmother.

Deeply invested in the areas of healing and personal growth, Karen gently guides people toward their own innate health and happiness through education, ceremony, soul retrieval, extraction work, and Reiki. Karen’s intention is to assist clients and students in finding their soul’s path, their true self, their source of power and freedom. She offers this with deep gratitude to her teachers, spirit guides, and the native healers and communities who have been so generous with their teaching, healing, and ceremonies.